In Central and Eastern European countries, memorial questions appeared right after the demise of the communist regimes in 1989–1991, revealing long-denied processes. The phenomenon of the rise of repressed memories along with the rewriting of history, and the political uses of the past are noticeable in Poland, Russia, and Ukraine, three countries whose histories are as often shared as their memories are divided.

The origins of the conference can be traced back to the recent findings in the Civic Archives of Milan Municipality of previously unpublished documentation (currently subject to an inventory and digitalization project) linked to the Arctic expedition of Umberto Nobile (1928) and the expedition to the Karakorum of Aimone di Savoia-Aosta, Duke of Spoleto (1928-29).